


movement stops in the windows

by cuddlepunk



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Depression, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Magical Realism, Murder, Panic Attacks, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-21
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-06-30 10:43:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15750078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuddlepunk/pseuds/cuddlepunk
Summary: Dan leaves gifts at unmarked graves, sites of cryptic deaths, and places of tragic happenings. He seeks out the dark unknown in any forgotten warehouse or seemingly cheerful bed and breakfast, leaving a path of small charms and other offerings wherever he goes.Phil works at a small gift shop where reality seems altered, and the only customer is a very cute boy with a very strange agenda.One day, Dan fucks up. Bad.





	1. The Church and The Lake

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to a new chaptered fic. You'll love it, I swear. 
> 
> Title from Die For Something Beautiful by Palaye Royale  
> Story partially from the podcast LORE 
> 
> TRIGGER WARNING!!!! PLEASE READ IF EASILY UPSET: the first chapter contains hanging, implied murder, stillbirth, mistreatment due to religious beliefs, and implied supernatural happenings. Also Phil being awkward bc he has a bad crush lmao.
> 
> I swear it'll end happy. And the core story, which isn't introduced yet, is very feminist and intellectual which I didn't plan originally but its cool.

An unassuming gift shop rests fifteen minutes of walking from the back door of Dan’s high school. On most overcast days, the shop’s stain glass windows show dim light within, its twisted wooden doors open to the misty air outside. It’s small enough to be easily overlooked from the busy street, nestled narrowly between eateries and shops with far more intrigue. It seems to buzz this time of day, just as a brown eyed boy steps out of school. 

Wrapping long, colorful scarves around himself before heading out into the cool afternoon used to be performed out of hatred of his navy school uniform, but now it’s a necessity. Wearing heavy clothing all the time acclimates your body to the warmth and weight, and Dan’s a prime example. Only similarly wandering peers were lucky enough to see his bundled form trod out the back doors after their last lessons, even fewer lay witness to the days he chooses side doors. Nobody would ask him where he’s going. Seniors forge their own paths. His happens to be to the gift shop.

“Welcome.” The cashier's voice is low and comforting, not unlike the nature of the store itself. 

Dan has to duck his brunet curls to avoid smacking his forehead on the short entrance door, which he’s done far too many times before. “Thank you.” Instantly, warm and bookish air enshrouds him. 

This new boy had been there for only the last few weeks. It’s owned by a wise woman named Clara, but it’s a side passion project for her. She’s still in on some weekends, but Dan’s been getting acquainted with Phil as of late. He’s more interesting than some other workers he’s met there, thankfully. Even though it’s a typical, some may say boring gift shop, Dan thinks it deserves far more eccentric people inside. Him and Phil do the job quite nicely. 

“Are you looking for anything in particular?” Phil asks, as if there’s any spots in the shop you can’t see directly from the entrance. “We got new charms the other day.”

Dan perks up and takes small steps on the old wooden floor. Even the gentlest footfalls creak. Kneeling to the shelf on the right of the register is even harder, as Dan’s long legs threaten to bump into other tightly packed displays of greeting cards and ceramic novelties. 

Dan loves the little pocket charms, and thankfully, the store carries them en masse. This is probably because their main customer buys a handful at least once a week. They’d be pointless to everyone else, much like the rest of the store’s stock, but Dan’s never been everyone else. Dan has always been anything but everyone else.

“I like the little frogs.” Phil says as Dan pokes careful fingers around the small dish of glass blown tree frogs, none of them greater than a nickel in diameter. “They look so realistic, some of them. I feel as though if I left one on a windowsill, it might hop out by morning.” Phil looks down on him from behind the counter, laying eyes on his mess of windswept curls, back bent in poor posture. 

When Dan doesn’t respond, he falters. “I mean- I don’t know, that was a little weird. I know it wouldn’t.”

Dan places three little frogs on the counter, along with five metal golden stars, and a couple silver plates inscribed with dandelions, all of the same miniature size. “No, I get what you mean. I feel the same way about some of these statues.” He gestures to the many stacked in the store, of varying questionability. 

“Ugh, tell me about it. Some of the child statues creep me out so bad. It can be challenging to work here alone sometimes.” Phil taps his fingers on the counter nervously. “It’s better when you’re here. Nobody else comes in, really. Will that be all?”

Dan looks around at the many rotating pillars of jewelry and paper goods, the shelves of knick knacks and keepsakes. Clutching his navy suit jacket closer in a shiver, he shakes his head at Phil and turns to a back corner. A rack of thick and colorful cotton scarves sits nearly untouched, and he picks one out from the pile, streaked with purples and blues. 

When he lays it carefully on the counter, recognition blooms behind Phil’s blue eyes. “Woah, is that where you got your scarf? The one you’re wearing?”

“Yeah, I guess it’s a little hard to tell now, I guess.” 

Countless phrases and small diagrams sit hand-stitched into Dan’s scarf in thick, contrasting thread. From diagrams of moths and black cats to entire prayers or short legends. 

“Did you do all that yourself, then?”

“Yeah.” 

He wants to continue. Yeah, my needlework has gotten better since I started, though. Yeah, I feel more protected with kind words around my neck. Yeah, it’s yet another of my weird fucking quirks, you probably think I’m a psychopath. Yeah. 

“That’s so cool! I’m excited to see what you do to this one. I mean, if you decide to stitch on this one. Or if you even decide to come back. I mean, whatever.” Phil’s hands stutter as he slides a glossy paper bag with Dan’s charms over. “Do you want a bag for the scarf?”

“I’ll come back, don’t worry. You’ll see it. And, uh, no thanks.” He rips the tag off the scarf. 

“Oh! Uh, I can throw that out.” Phil holds his delicate hand out, accidentally bumping Dan’s.

Phil stands there, staring at the stain glass of the front doors and memorizing every statue on the shelves, for several hours most weekdays. There’s not an inch of the store he doesn’t know by heart. And yet, seeing Dan’s fluffy hair and rosy cheeks there, waiting for dimples to form with the wonder of a child following the scent of a rose bush. All the anticipation of a college student waiting to eat the hot pocket in their microwave. Something about this familiarity of a crush, in all its tragically elegant and pathetic facets, is entirely new. 

“Thank you.” Dan passes the tag over, winding the new scarf over his old one and relishing in the increased protection.

He says “I’ll see you soon.” as he steps into the street once more.

“Yeah, you too!” Phil calls, just a little too loud, waving just a little too aggressively for the small shop. 

Dan hears him knock over a cup of pens in his own excitement, letting out a small yell of surprise in response. 

Part of Dan wants to turn on his heels, buy one of those rose gold heart charms, and press it hard into Phil’s warm palm. He’d probably drop it in surprise, though. Lord only knows how he managed to land a job in such a breakable and cramped store, being so clumsy. 

Stepping out of the unmarked gift shop feels like leaving the safest place on earth for a war. The street is too wide, filled with chain stores and revolving glass doors. It’s bright, but not warm in its glow like the little shop. It’s LED, blinding without a hint of the safety brightly lit spaces usually offer. The cold outside wind runs quickly through the streets much like the shoppers there, full paper bags swinging like hurricanes. He wades in the crowds and curses his height, trying to blend in. 

The walk back to Dan’s house is long enough on its own, and he really should take the tube instead, especially considering his journey seldom stops there. He enters his own front door to a house absent of his everworking parents, but he leaves again soon after. One apple rests in his cold hand, crisp and ready for education-exhausted lips. 

It’s not necessary for Dan to walk just outside town, watching as houses get further apart, as grassy fields and forests lay in the distance and not more streets or skyscrapers. It’s even less important to memorize the off-beaten path to a tall church next to a lake. He doesn’t even enter the church, or past the fences into the graveyard. No, he walks 500 feet past the north side of the lake into the field there. He’s alone there, too, standing awkwardly tall in a lonely, forgotten plot of land. Anyone passing by might question his motives, pin him as a mischievous student. Maybe he is.

Over a hundred years previous, a woman named Ruth was buried there in an unmarked grave. Dan doesn’t know much about her, but he knows she was a schoolteacher. She gave lessons to the kids that used to live in the houses he passed, protected them from daily dangers and helped them shape the world he walks today. She fell pregnant out of wedlock, but hid it well and gave birth alone. She claims the child was born still, and buried her child underneath the floorboards of a farmhouse she taught classes in. 

The farm is abandoned now, but Dan’s broken into that barn, looked at the wooden planks. He’s sat there and cried. Maybe he was really crying out of exhaustion, stress of school, cursing his lack of freedom, how his hair straightener broke that morning. But he was also crying bitter tears for humanity, for loss of life, for how cruel we can be. Did the child’s mother have a choice? Was it really born still? Does it matter now, all these years later? He wants to believe it would have been so much different today, even though stories like it still happen all the time. He plans to return there soon too, leave more little toys in that lone, rotting barn.

A few schoolchildren saw Ruth there at the barn, and reported her crimes of adultery, concealing her pregnancy, and of ending the life of a baby. The townspeople were quick to hang her for her crimes, deny her a burial in their cemetery. So they put her out by the lake. Sure, Dan’s not exactly sure where she was buried. She could be a hundred feet off from where he stands. 

But he doesn't care. It feels like the right thing to do. And wiping fresh juice from his face with a navy sleeve, Dan takes a second apple out of his backpack along with five little golden stars. He scatters them carefully, nearly hidden under the grass. 

Metal stars won’t change what happened all those years ago. In fact, they’ll probably get picked up by children after mass, or caught in a lawn mower’s gears. The apple might get eaten by a squirrel or deer passing through, dragged into the nearby forest before decomposing. Dan knows this. 

Mist shifts over the lake. Curtains in the church windows close abruptly. A gust of wind blows past, but it feels warmer than the surrounding air, warmer than the cold cement of the ancient church. When Dan takes another bite of his own apple, it tastes a little sweeter. 

None of this means anything. That’s what makes it honest and true.


	2. hair bands

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't totally edit this lmao tell me if you see any errors also 
> 
> TRIGGER WARNING: self harm by burning, child abduction, slurs (mentioned), bullying, sexual assault (mentioned briefly), murder, food, panic attacks, general prejudice n stuff
> 
> its REALLY not as bad as it sounds (most of it) but just be super careful bc I dont want to hurt anyone 
> 
> also I really hope you like it but tell me all the reasons why if you dont also have a good day im rooting for you have a glass of water

Dan wakes up feeling bad. 

The light stumbling in through his windows is only discernible to the most dark-adjusted eyes; it’s just barely enough for him to see his hand in front of his face. It’s probably around 4am, but going back to sleep is already a write-off. If he doesn’t want the rest of the day to be the same, he has to put major effort in from this second on. He’s had enough bad days to know that’s a fact.

He’s usually the first person up anyways, so starting the coffee machine before hopping in the shower is routine. The hard water hitting the shower floor runs the risk of waking his family up, but he can’t find it in him to care all that much. Getting lost in all these little steps is the only thing that can distract him from how uninteresting and unsatisfying his life is. He forcibly wipes the thick layer of oil off his teenage skin, scrubbing across embarrassingly assembled limbs. He feels like a half finished house in the Sims sometimes. Someone put the sink in the living room and forgot the front door. The stinging hot of the water feels good, though.

He ruffles his towel dried hair in an effort to fluff it up, make it easier to air dry. It won’t be hard with his airy curls already forming. Dan slides on a white button-up on and opens the curtains in this bedroom, letting the sunrise drizzle honey highlights on his skin. He tries to remember the kinds of cereal they have in the cupboard while he absentmindedly checks his phone.

There’s an amber alert. 

The victim was last seen about four miles off from the front of Dan’s old elementary school. She was in a pink velvet scrunchie and her school uniform. He doesn’t need to finish the list to know what it looks like, obviously. 

You know what, perhaps towel drying is good enough prep for hair straightening. It’s one of his favorite parts of the day, taking sweet time to feel the controlled warmth of the hot plates, making sure every strand is in its place like an interior designer placing numerous throw pillows. Sometimes the fluff of his curls does feel like throw pillows. He doesn’t straighten it everyday anymore, he stopped caring how he looked a long time ago, but the familiarity of it is nice if nothing else.

He could put his fingers between the two plates and squeeze until the whole house smells like charred death. He doesn't. His mind is just mean sometimes. 

\--- 

School is easy. English is fun. (School, as used in this context, is the system of education. Dealing with peers is not easy. Returning to the same muted color tile floors every day is not easy. Pretending like any of this is worth it is not easy. But English is fun.)

His literature teacher has a Nirvana poser on her wall but her voice is soft clear. “What are our thoughts, then?”

The whole classroom lets out a collective annoyed sigh as Dan’s hand shoots up. This happens every time, but especially on such political pieces as Animal Farm. They finished the book for homework. Mrs. Griffith doesn’t call on him first, picking a girl at the back of the room.

“I feel like the author was relying a little too heavily on shock factor to get his points across.”

Another boy gets picked. “The ‘shock factors’ weren’t just violence for violence’s sake. They were the author’s points, like what would happen if whoever, people in power or whatever, if they don’t listen to him, though.”

Dan pipes up, considering it’s already become more of an open discussion. “I think the real shock factor is that he decided to use farm animals to get his points across despite personifying them heavily since the start. It’s like, what’s the point?”

James, an asshole, responds. “Well, the point was at first the animals lived as animals do, in anarchy. They became more and more personified because of the civilized government they created overtime.” He has the tone of someone who will always think they’re better than you and it’s convincing enough to make you feel like it too.

“The animals were already a part of and aware of the government around them before they overthrew the farmers, though. They weren’t living in anarchy. They were the lowest class in this scenario, not literal animals, and they never were.” Dan doesn’t like to admit he’ll fight James on anything, even if he’s not totally in the right.

He looks out the window to avoid meeting James’ eyes. There’s a purple scrunchie in the grass, muddied with dirt. It’s purple. It’s not the right scrunchie. It’s fine. They’re having a discussion in English. He’s fine. He hears James again just fine and it doesn’t sound muffled by the blood pounding in Dan’s ears because he just overreacts about everything and he’s so sensitive and a scrunchie could send him off the rails. He takes a few deep breaths in the least noticeable way.

“It doesn’t matter, does it? Either way the morals are the same; societies will always find order.”

James is smart and hot and knows way more trivia than Dan but he also uses slurs like they’re going out of style whenever he talks outside the classroom. James gropes girls at parties but he’s at the top of all his classes and is in every teacher’s best favor. It fucking sucks to have your rival be smarter than you. There are a million counter arguments Dan could make but he’s made them enough times to know it never brings as much satisfaction as he hopes anyways. It’s not even an argument but it feels like it is because there are always a million feelings and words pounding against the inside of Dan’s head at all times. Why does he have to make all of this so hard for himself.

The teacher picks another student to talk. Dan excuses himself to the bathroom to splash cold water on his face and listen to Radiohead for a few minutes. Calm down. 

\---

There’s a McDonald’s just out of the way of his walk home, nestled between a bank and a Dollar General. It’s a more run down side of town, but the standardized store lights shine just as bright as they do in the heart of London. He awkwardly orders three cheeseburgers and sits in the corner of the shop to down them in relative shame. He used to care a lot more, but his general insecurity isn’t all gone. It’s easy to feel like the whirring of the heating vents above him are mocking him. The air vents are mocking him. They think he looks stupid and the way he eats is weird. And they’re saying it through some mock Morse code of concerning creaks and blowing air. At least that’s how it feels most of the time. 

When he’s done, the brisk air outside gives him a shiver. He pulls his scarf tighter around him.

He looks into the alleyway between the two stores. Deciding it’s clean enough to sit down, he does, with his back to the wall and knees tucked under his chin. 

Hundreds of years ago (this is a frequently recurring phrase in Dan’s head), when someone you knew fell sick, changed behavior, or if your baby was born “undesirable”, you could accuse them of being a changeling. Taken and replaced by some sort of malevolent fae of the forest. Of course, the only way to get your true friend back was to burn them over a fire. 

You can’t be exactly sure where any of these things occurred but it’s close enough to Dan’s house that he wonders sometimes if they happened right in his kitchen. A man burning his sick wife to death over her own fire. In her own kitchen. The kitchen in which she cooked and cleaned for him for years. And he murders her, just like that, and for what? What was it that really drove them to do this? It could be fear of falling ill himself, fear of her never bouncing back. Maybe she would have died anyways, just a few days later, you could never know for sure. It could be anything, maybe he always hated her, wanted to live free but was bound by society. Maybe he was having a bad day and knew no one would care anyways. 

Either way, he dumped her body there. It used to be a field, Dan pictures dainty wildflowers, all pinpricks of whites and pastel purples. Soft stems and leaves falling across her charred black skin. She didn’t deserve this. None of them fucking deserved any of this. Dan thinks about the kids that James makes fun of. Spitting words of malice at anyone different than him. Dan wonders what he would have done to them if they lived in a world where you could get away with murder for the same reasons.

When the husband left her here in a shallow grave, she was only wearing her tights. Of course, Dan doesn’t know how long her hair was, but he pictures it in a long mess and he doesn’t know what else to do. He places a single cotton hair band on the ground. He likes to meditate on the lessons the past teaches but they’re mostly the same. Be kind and understanding. Stand up to injustice. He pictures her before she fell sick, outspoken and laughing and dancing in the same flowers. Sometimes it almost feels like they’re sitting there with him, nearly pressed to his side. If she was, he’d ask her what it’s like to have her grave be a McDonalds. 

He figures the same could happen to him someday. He makes peace with it and hopes the teens that eat there in the future don’t feel like the air conditioning is mocking them, because the dead sure aren’t. The dead don’t have any worries. 

He leans his head back against the stone wall before getting up and looking at the hair band one last time. The sun’s starting to set. He should get home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HI I HOPED YOU LIKED THAT BUT IF NOT TELL ME EXACTLY WHY, LEAVE A COMMENT, JUST SAY HI I PROMISE I DONT BITE, I HOPE YOURE DOING WELL THO. GO TO SLEEP AT A REASONABLE HOUR AND REMEMBER TO WATER YOUR PLANTS ILY


	3. city-dark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi I'm sorry im so shitty at updating, im graduating a year early this year and I have application deadlines and so many fucking classes.
> 
> and my own terribly embarrassing crush to deal with. I'm definitely more phil than dan on this one hahahahahaha
> 
> ALSO PLS READ: I've never had a beta before but if anyone's actually really passionate about this story and how I portray the characters, please consider reaching out to me on this one. im probably not gonna update any faster than before lol, but id really appreciate some constructive criticism or an extra set of eyes, but ONLY if you actually TRULY love this story like I do. if you just enjoy reading it passively, you'll still see it finished, don't worry.

The cans are so heavy he almost drops them before they make it to the plastic bags. The width of his hands does little to help him. When Dan’s tired like this, the groceries seem to approach menacingly down the conveyor belt. An army of cereal boxes and berries have decided it’s time to take him down, competing with the harsh white lights above trying to make him pass out from a migraine. Music with all the personality of a beige cardigan without pockets rests like a veil over every aisle and checkout line. There’s little to catch your eye at Asda.

Even so, Dan would die without the routine of a weekend job. He needs funding for all the stupid shit he pulls, sure, but it’s more than that. If he doesn’t have something to make him get out of bed every morning, he won’t. For days. So, he scans everything as carefully as his 6am mind can manage.

“Your total is fifteen pound thirty.” His voice does little to mask how exhausted he is. “Have a nice day.”

From the corner of his darkly circled eyes, the pony tail of Dan’s manager whips around like a spinning gold coin as she turns to face him from the break room doorway. “We have lemon cake today. Thought I’d mention it, since nobody’s excited to be up right now.”

Her name is Kristy, and if Dan remembers correctly, she was at a show the previous night. “Oh yeah, how was the concert?”

She sighs dramatically, a whimsical expression better fit for a ballgown than a supermarket uniform. He imagines her for a moment, not within the bland walls of an Asda but a palace, all her expressive hopes and dreams finally illustrated by the world she creates around her. Dan doesn’t have a crush on Kris, but he finds himself thinking kindly of her rather often. It’s hard not to. It’s difficult to tell whether or not she makes a conscious effort to make everyone like her, but if she is, she’s damn good at it.

“I almost held his hand. The lead singer, I mean. It was pretty great.”

Dan smiles despite his mood. “You’ll get him next time.”

“If only. I need a spell or something.” As another customer approaches Dan’s checkout, she turns away once more. “I won’t keep you.” She says it with a friendly wave and turns on her heels to check on a different section of the store.

Kristy’s one of those people who can make anything at least mildly interesting, even impromptu mock TED talks on why Alex Gaskarth is the one of the greatest modern songwriters. In addition to providing him with extensive pop punk knowledge, Dan’s job also thankfully lets him wear a scarf with his uniform. And two thermals under it. And fingerless gloves. Although maybe he’d feel more awake if he was shivering. His shifts always feel endless till they’re over, then it all seems like such a short affair. It’s 4pm before he knows it. 

His last customer is a young woman in a suit jacket buying three bottles of sleeping pills. He doesn’t think about it. Surely she was on her way to work. Surely it would have been rude of him to say anything. What would he even say in that situation? He signs off, definitely without thinking about it, nor thinking about if he’s ever sold drugs that someone’s small child has gotten ahold of. Cold meds can’t be that strong. It wouldn’t be his fault anyways, right?

Even on the grid of the sidewalk outside, and after swiping a substantial amount of lemon cake, he’s finding it difficult to walk in a straight line. Maybe because his feet are killing him after standing for so many hours. He definitely should have gotten another coffee before leaving work too, but whatever. There’s a coffee shop every two steps in town.

He nearly misses the door of the giftshop, swept downstreet by hazy thinking. He doesn’t, though, and bows his head to step in once more.

“Hello Dan!” Phil says, bright and teeming with warmth. 

Phil always looks like he’s ready to boil over with nervous energy. Fire crackers before July. Dan tries to edge him back in his own quiet way, or at least warm his hands with the flames. 

“Hey.”

There’s usually not a clear reason for him to be there, most of the time he doesn’t even buy anything. Some days, Dan doesn’t realize he’s headed there until he’s through the doors, almost like the odd place decided on its own he must return. If there’s one thing Phil’s overly polite and awkward demeanor was good for, it was earlier on in weeks when Dan started sitting in the old wicker chair up against the wall and knitting without a word. He’d been doing it for quite a while at that point, being the only person who took advantage of the space, and with such a somber, unbothersome disposition. Clara used to bring him cinnamon buns from down the road every so often and they’d chat as he got his coursework done. It’s an odd setup, but every good one is. 

He takes out his needles and settles into the novelty throw blankets laid over the chair as Phil returns to his laptop, sat poised on a high stool behind the checkout counter. 

Dan calmly watches Phil’s fingers tap the keys, sporadic, like he could type five lines in a minute then go five without pressing another. “What are you working on?”

Phil always has to clear the whole desk before he even gets his macbook out, as he’s incredibly accident prone and will knock over anything in sight. He taps on the clean wood as he answers. “Writing up the methods we used for an experimental short film the other day. Creating is fun and free, but having to explain why you did every little thing sorta kills it. I think so, anyways.”

Dan twirls the thick navy blue yarn of his unfinished scarf and stares at the floral carpet. “What was it about?” 

“There were space worms involved.” 

Dan can’t help the grin that pulls at his lips. “Space worms? Casual space worms?”

Phil peeks out from behind a spinning necklace display. “Business casual maybe, although we can’t be certain of the space worm fashion standards.” 

Dan muffles a laugh in his scarf. “Guess not.”

They settle into a relative silence, filled only by the tapping of Phil’s laptop keyboard and Dan’s knitting needles clacking together. Phil eyes the warped stain glass of the windows, cloudy with time or stylistic intent he’s not sure. The light that manages to shine through from the outside is harsh and white, but the lights inside are a muted orange, casting every greeting card and porcelain statue in a comforting manilla. He begs the heavy throw blankets and sturdier oak shelves to lend a little self assurance. 

“Hey, do you wanna go get coffee in a bit? Nobody else comes in anyways.” He can hear his heart in his ears, the beats punctuating every long second before Dan’s reply. 

Dan’s voice is low and relaxed, like he’s not even trying. “Rulebreakers, are we?”

Phil ruffles his hair, knocking his elbow with the top of his macbook and pointedly deciding not to react to the pain. “If you’d like that?”

Dan eyes him, taking in how his bright blue eyes scatter gazes on the floor, like his mind is a cat and mouse of his colorful, clumsy nature and the ever-present restraint in his gentle voice. “Yeah. I wanna go.”

“I’m glad. I like that scarf, by the way. The one you’re making.”

“Thank you.” Dan’s voice always seems to be so quiet it demands someone who cares to be able to hear him.

Later on, when Dan notices Phil check his watch and slide his laptop away, he starts slipping off the stitches until he’s tying the yarn at the corner. When Phil comes out from the counter, Dan notices he’s just an inch or two taller than him. He has to raise his arms the smallest bit to wrap the thick scarf around Phil’s jacketed shoulders, smoothing out the newly crafted rows against his chest.

“Is this mine now?” Phil asks as Dan grabs his bag. 

“Of course. Which way’s the shop?” 

“The little one two blocks down on the left.” He pauses in distracted awe as Dan pulls knitted gloves on over his fingerless gloves. His brown eyes may be warm, but Phil’s sure his hands must be ice cold. “Oh, and thank you. For the scarf.”

Dan waves his hand, brushing it off. “Of course.” 

It’s a little odd to see Phil outside the shop. His stature is straight, posture much better than Dan’s. As his head floats above the sparse crowd of people, it often seems to get lost in the clouds. He may stand tall, but his frame is delicate to its own fault, a teetering disposition his thoughts seem to mirror. He doesn’t miss any turns though, and is holding open a door for Dan soon enough. 

“The hot chocolate here is to die for. If you like cinnamon and marshmallows, anyways.”

“I’ll venture to say it’d be a rarity to find someone who doesn’t favor cinnamon and marshmallows.”

“I guess you’re right.” Phil says, before ordering perhaps the most horrendously sweet frappe ever conceived in the modern era. Is eggnog coffee really a thing? And with extra whip? Dan’s head hurts thinking about it. 

Phil insists he foots the bill for Dan’s drink, if only in return for the chunky knit scarf. He orders the hot chocolate, no whipped cream. 

They chose a booth by a window, cold emanating from the spotless glass. If the tall buildings hadn’t already covered the near-setting sun, it’d surely be too bright to sit there. At the same time, Dan hates how early the sun sets in the winter. It feels like the world ends every day at 3pm, the light never to return again. 

“I grew up in the north, so I don’t mind the winters here, really.”

Dan doesn’t have to ask to know he must have thought something out loud. “That’s a bit odd. You seem like a summer-spring type of person.”

“You didn’t strike me as someone who thrives in the bright, humid summers, but you are.”

Dan wiggles his hands in his gloves. “Well I certainly don’t thrive in the cold.”

Phil smiles, playing with his own pale hands rather than making eye contact. “Guess not.”

It’s city-dark, that sort of night sky where it’s still grey with light pollution but as dark as it’ll get, before they know it. Phil thanks him for the scarf one last time before they depart, striding down separate directions of the street outside. The winter slaps him in the face, and Dan shudders at the thought of the walk back home.

Dan knows it’d be a little odd to turn back as he takes his first few steps, but when he does, he finds Phil staring straight back at him too. 

They blush and turn away.

**Author's Note:**

> LEAVE A COMMENT!!! OF WHAT YOU THOUGHT, IF I MADE A TYPO, HOW YOUR DAY IS, IDK I DONT BITE


End file.
